20/08/2014

If you’ve ever seen some of my outtakes from my Me and Mine shoots over on Instagram you’ll know that my biggest challenge in recent months has not so much been getting everyone to either smile at the same time or even just look at the camera (from the results you’ll know that I’ve clearly given up on both of those lofty aims), as keeping the girls the right side of the camera.

It seems there’s every danger that left to our own devices it wouldn’t just be Mummy that disappears behind the lens more often than not, but the ladies too. I’d say it would leave just H in the shot but as his comfort zone for appearing in photos generally includes holding one of his children we might just be about to move into landscapes and still life because these daughters of mine are getting more and more into their photos.

They both know how to press the shutter on the big camera; Kitty wields the remote trigger with a confident concentration, and we’re starting to have to have more than one conversation about why it is really really important that we do not touch, lift, move or otherwise attempt to abscond with Mummy’s big camera.

But my phone is relatively robust and so every now and then, and usually when we’re on grass, I’ll hand it over to see what the world looks like through Kitty’s eyes.

Her earliest pictures were all fuzzy and sideways, usually taken while she was moving, and usually including a pink smudge from at least one finger, but she’s definitely getting there; she’s remembering to hold the phone at both ends, the fingers are if not disappearing, at least being relegated to the edges, and if she does still tend to take 30 photos of the same thing before moving on; well that might be a case of ‘monkey see, monkey do’; I’ll plead the privilege against self incrimination on that one.

So for today, for a change, and as a nice distraction from the fact that I don’t have any pictures of a cute new baby to show you; may I present our afternoon walk to the windmill according to Kitty, or at least the part of it where she got to play with my phone while Elma and I had a little cuddle and a little top of Mama milk to soothe some incoming teeth:

And while I’ve edited in terms of numbers (heavily – she really loved taking pictures of that wall!), they’re otherwise all straight out of my phone. I’m seriously tempted to have them printed for her; I think she’d get rather a kick out of being able to say “I took that photo”, I know I would have when I was little. But the one that I want to print for me as much as for her is the companion to the only photo in this post that I took, and should probably be titled:

“My mother, multitasking”

Well what else is a giant baby bump for if not to rest your nursing toddler’s feet on while you take a picture!

Space for the Butterflies is…

A story of motherhood from a slightly hippy working mama who couldn't stop writing if she tried. It's my creativity, set out in fabric, yarn, and cake, our family memories and adventures and all the evidence you need that photography is addictive.
Hi, I'm Carie, welcome to the story so far...